"On Balmer Island, where mopeds serve as a popular form of transportation, the population increases to 100,000 during the summer months. To reduce the number of accidents involving mopeds and pedestrians, the town council of Balmer Island should limit the

The author states that in order to control the number of accidents caused by mopeds in Balmer, the island officials should follow the same policies as the neighbor island, Seaville. However, not enough information are present to make the argument as clear as it needs to be. Actually, the answer to a variety of questions is required before one can make a decision to whether follow the presented advice or not.

First of all, is should be asked whether mopeds are really involved in this high number accidents, and if yes are they the only cause in the phenomenon. It is very possible that simply pedestrians do not obey the laws properly and put moped riders in difficulties of various forms which can result in such accidents. Or perhaps, new people that come to Balmer, are not even aware of these laws, or not used to the presence of mopeds in the streets, and therefore cause these accidents. Besides, even if mopeds are directly involved it is possible that the accidents are stemming from another cause. For example, narrow pedestrian walks could make the pedestrian to use some space of the streets and so the probability of an accident increases.

Second of all, even in the case that mopeds are the sole culprit for the accidents, it should become clear that decreasing the number of rental mopeds, is an effective choice. Perhaps the need for rental mopeds in Balmer is not as much as Seaville. Because many of residents owe mopeds for themselves and mopeds are not expensive that visitors in summer find it better to by a moped at the beginning of summer and sell it in the end. In this case, limiting the number of rental mopeds merely damages the business of renting mopeds and will have no influence on the number of accidents.

Finally, a wide range of inquiries should be answered about other possible factors that reduced the accidents in Seaville. One should ask, is there any solid evidence that limitations on the number of the mopeds were the sole cause of reduction in accidents? In fact, there might have been a decrease in the population of visitors of Seaville in the last summer, or maybe the accidents were reduced because moped riders suddenly started to be more careful after they experienced many accidents in the previous summer. Besides, even if limiting the number of rental mopeds has been the only engaging factor, regarding the population of Seaville and Balmer, there might be need to put more or less limitations, rather than the exact decline from 50 to 25. But, none of these can be decided for sure if not enough information is accessible.

All in all, the author should have added more data from Seaville if he wants to recommend the policies used in that island, for Balmer. Besides, many more information about other candidates for causing accidents and also the efficiency of the limiting rental mopeds policy needs to be provided. But, undoubtedly, in its current state the argument is not persuasive and is unlikely to have the desired influence as the author wants.